lator. He was angered by Wood’s mention of the Brady article as his source. “He admitted
that the accumulator was indeed a device, though in an experimental state. ...”
Reich then arranged for Wood to visit the site where the accumulators were con-
structed. This visit led to a novelistic twist in the story. At the workshop, Wood met Clista
Templeton. Clista had taken over the construction of the accumulators after the death of
her father, Herman, in 1944. Some three months after Wood met Clista, they married. Clista
was the main informant to Wood about the accumulators. This was a particularly dramatic
example of how personal and scientific issues often became enmeshed where Reich was
involved.
Wood learned from Clista Templeton that to date some 250 accumulators of vary-
ing sizes had been built. Most important, Clista supplied names and addresses of accumula-
tor users to Wood. Her guilt or fear about her role as informer was expressed in her reluc-
tance to become a witness in any trial against Reich; she did not want Reich to know that
she had “doublecrossed him,” to use Wood’s phrase^10.
Following Wood’s report, Wharton replied in September in a letter to the Boston
office out of which Wood worked: “From our review of this material it appears that we have
here a fraud of the first magnitude being perpetrated by a very able individual fortified to a
considerable degree by men of science. In order to invoke appropriate ... action, we must lay
our foundation well and secure in the beginning considerable data and information.”^11
On September 24, Wood returned to visit Reich at Orgonon. He continued his
questions about Reich’s teachings, whereupon Reich referred him to his books. Reich
became angry when Wood asked about his expulsion from the International Psychoanalytic
Association. It must have seemed demeaning to Reich to discuss his important and painful
conflict with Freud in answer to a routine question from an FDA agent who knew absolute-
ly nothing about these matters except Brady’s statement that “Freud saw fit to take issue with
him.”
During the course ofhis visit with Wood (who on both occasions had come to
Orgonon without prior notice),Reich was interrupted by someone from Rangeley who had
come to discuss his accumulator treatment. (Reich did not usually see patients at Orgonon
but made an exception for local citizens, whom he treated free of charge.) To quote Wood
in his report:
According to Dr. Reich, Mr. Brackett was confined to his bed with arthri-
tis three years ago and could not walk or use his hands. Brackett is an old man with
hands stiffand out ofshape, but he could move his fingers and walked fairly well.
He was the real “testimonial” type and Dr. Reich took great delight in bringing out
Mr. Brackett’s miraculous story of recovery by use of the accumulator. (His case
can be investigated ifdesired.)^12For a period,Reich continued to cooperate with the FDA. He told physicians work-
ing with him to answer questions about the accumulator but not to supply the names of
338 Myron SharafFury On Earth